76 comments:

When I was in the Air Force a friend of mine earned himself an official letter of reprimand for circulating a letter within the chaplain system among those in his own congregation that fear was a sin. He backed this up with scripture in an argument that it was a failure to trust God.

The reprimand was, essentially, that he was not allowed to call *anything* a sin. He was not allowed to tell people that they were sinning. Which was a curious spectacle, really.

But that's what you get when the government gets to dictate religious practice.

It is illegal to be a Christian in the UK, and it will soon be illegal to be one in the USA. We are following rapidly in their footsteps.

Read what happened to that man. He did nothing aggressive at all. He simply repeated exactly what the Bible says, that which all Christians are bound to believe. Such beliefs as that are not allowed to be held any longer; they are not politically correct. Goodness knows, we are certainly headed for the maximum in PC ourselves!

In a letter smuggled out of prison and dated just weeks before his execution, von Moltke wrote:

"(I've just remembered something else. He asked me: "Do you see that you are guilty?" I said in essence No. Whereupon Freisler: "You see: if you still don't recognize it, if you still need to be instructed on it, it shows that you think differently and have thereby excluded yourself from the fighting community of the people.")"

I expect to discover soon whatever the preacher may have written about homosexuality in his emails. After all, hate-thought is the root cause of hate speech. We should always look for the root causes of social disorder.

What a depressing spectacle the UK has become. Once the world's greatest nation, now a sad sack testament to the cancerous effect of political correctness. This is the progress progressives imagine for the US.

Never did much like the neologism "homophobic." What is meant would be better conveyed by "homoantipathic." Plus, it's kind of musical. I can practically hear little Ronny Howard singing it to the tune of "Gary, Indiana," right now.

I think we should go fight a war to remind them of which country really adheres to the true legacy of freedom. Perhaps they forgot that Magna Carta was signed by George Washington in The United States of America!!!

Fucking King George-following tyrannical limeys! Where do they get the gall?

when the heck did the main tenet of christianity become "thou shalt rant about homos" ?? of course we don't want people arrested for speech, but this guy sounds like he'd fit right in with the westboro 'church' folks, so neither am i about to jump to his defense.

Let's not be censorious old fossils about Chases's use of whitespace. It's artistic, modern, edgy. Just the sort of thing that Laurence Sterne, e.e. cummings or Phillip Wylie might do. Pushing the envelope. Only effective if seldom done.

Speaking of Phillip Wylie: It's a crime that Finnley Wren is out of print.

The art of mind control has morphed into the ONLY art for which rewards and penalties are seriously and instantly assessesd. The practice of a bold free speech like a Sarah Palin's can still occurr. But many digital age communicators will not really like bandwidth being used on those jerks.

Context is so important. A simple (and factually true) sentence such as "The Bible condemns homosexuality" could be part of an anti-gay harangue, an attack on the Bible, or a bullet point in a lecture on religion and sexuality.

I suspect the preacher's remarks were more inflammatory than the article lets on, but maybe I'm wrong. It becomes awfully difficult to draw lines when you start criminalizing speech. For example, there are a great many things that one could say about an ethnic group, like, say, Jews, but that one can say about adherents of an ideology, like, say, Zionists. But when "Zionist" becomes a code word for "Jew", what really is the difference?

Eventually, one is forced to resort to the Potter Stewart standard, that hate speech cannot be defined but is immediately apparent as such. It doesn't work for me. Free speech is messy, but I don't believe in the right not to be offended.

I'm gay and I am disgusted at how the British government treats its citizens, and how British citizens let themselves be treated by their government. Politicians should not be telling citizens how they may or may not express themselves. If they can't handle debate, then they should stop pretending they are a free country.

The speech police will be here soon enough. The Louisiana legislature has already passed a law (not yet passed in the Senate and signed by the Gov) on curbing bullying.

The text of the law...

House Bill 1259 would criminalize the transmission of electronic textual, visual, written or oral communication that is intended to “coerce, abuse, torment, intimidate, harass, embarrass or cause emotional distress” to anyone under the age of 17.

In regards to the preacher, I'd say that any apology/explanation that contains the word but, as his does, should have been rephrased. Turn the arrest for homophobia into an arrest for practicing one's religion: I am being arrested for preaching words out of the Bible, the book of the Religion I follow.

The obvious answer is the Church of England should behead the arresting officer, have riots for a month, burn 5,000 cars or so, and chant 'death to gays!' in the streets.

Then they would be given protected special snowflake status like the muslims.

But since we all know they would never do all that... off to prison you go you mean old christian trying to push your religion on others! Just ignore the 800 lb gorilla in the room you brave brave gay rights people.

Justices Breyer and Ginsburg, I know you visit here often (which one is you is "Jeremy" again? or is that Scalia pulling a Moby?) so please: don't use foreign law or court rulings when making your rulings (treaties excepted).

House Bill 1259 would criminalize the transmission of electronic textual, visual, written or oral communication that is intended to “coerce, abuse, torment, intimidate, harass, embarrass or cause emotional distress” to anyone under the age of 17.

Or draw stick figures with funny hair? We already are under threat of death for showing art that depicts Mohammed so I guess that means that Muslims are mentally under the age of 17 and also a protected class.

As a result of foolishness like this, I am beginning to have second thoughts about visiting friends in the UK. Visiting doesn’t sound terribly appealing when conversations become minefields with the potential of a night in jail and criminal charges.

Quoting from a reported comment in the newspaper, Sam Webster said: “Case law has ruled that the orthodox Christian belief that homosexual conduct is sinful is a belief worthy of respect in a democratic society."

So where's the beef?

Here's the beef:

A court determining WHAT is a belief "worthy of respect in a democratic society."

Now THAT'S the chiller.

(Minow work for them too? "(R)espectful" free speech, and all that.)

I am loving the guys and gals of the American Revolution and the Founding Fathers more every day.

Harry Hammond, a pensioner, was convicted under Section 5 of the Act in 2002 for holding up a sign saying “Stop immorality. Stop Homosexuality. Stop Lesbianism. Jesus is Lord” while preaching in Bournemouth.

United States Congress1789Amendment I

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

He was not allowed to tell people that they were sinning. Which was a curious spectacle, really.

And do you know why? Because calling out sin requires there to be judgment and of course we are not allowed to judge, because some jerk-off will bring up some nonsense about rocks and glass houses knowing perfectly well that only a fool wouldn't call a sin a sin because of the doctrine of non-judgment rules as a measure of political correctness. The Velvet Mafia and their cohorts have done a fine job of infesting speech codes wherever they can. The UK is a lost cause at this point, the US hopefully will shake off this type of nonsense wherever it exists.